


Beast Island

by HaroThar



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Background Bow&Perfuma, Background Bow/Glimmer, Beast Island (She-Ra), Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Behavior, Canon-Typical Violence, Episode Fix-it, Fix-It, Gen, Scorpia goes to Beast Island
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-12
Packaged: 2021-01-29 04:20:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21404089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HaroThar/pseuds/HaroThar
Summary: A Scorpia-centric retelling of the Beast Island arc of season 4.In which Scorpia joins Adora, Bow, and Swift Wind on the quest to rescue Entrapta, since the whole point of her leaving the Horde in the first place was so that she could do that. Largely canon-compliant with the plot progressing exactly as it did in canon, post-fic.
Relationships: Entrapta/Scorpia (She-Ra), implied
Comments: 7
Kudos: 68





	Beast Island

**Author's Note:**

> I will take a hammer and FIX the canon

Bow and Adora slid down the ropes from the high window, cautious with the drop, but not as cautious as they had been the first however many times they’d done this.

“I’ve never lied to Glimmer before,” Bow said, anxious and staring through the pale lavender stone in front of him. “I mean, it’s not ‘lying’ lying. I left a note. Three, actually, but still.”

“We’re doing the right thing,” Adora assured with unshakable determination. If she was angry at Glimmer, she wasn’t showing it that moment. “We can’t let what happened in Mara’s time happen again. And Glimmer’s gonna be angry at us,” there was the anger, the frustration, the ‘if she would just _listen,’_ “but at least she’ll be around to be angry.”

Bow followed Adora down, knowing she was right, but stomach still twisted in knots. “Do you think I should leave another note?”

Adora’s anger flared, but even in this state she knew directing it at Glimmer would just make everything worse. “We’re sneaking out, Bow, could you keep it down a little?”

“Sorry.”

“HEY ADORA!” Swift Wind shouted joyously, landing on the balcony Adora and Bow stood on. The two desperately gestured at him to shush up as he loudly explained his heroic deeds of being a general nuisance to horse-owners everywhere, and Adora finally clamped her hand over his muzzle. 

“Swifty, you gotta keep it down,” she tried to assert, right before the doors behind them opened and Frosta came out, rubbing her eyes in a way that belied her age. Bow tried to deflect, but it didn’t work.

“I know what you’re doing,” Frosta said. Her eyes narrowed a moment, then softened. “You’d better hurry.”

“You’re--you’re not going to try and stop us?” Adora asked, relieved.

Frosta shook her head.

“Stop what?” Scorpia asked, also bleary and walking slow, thanks to her restraints. She saw them, saw Swift Wind, and frowned. “Wait. Are you..?”

“We can’t wait for Glimmer to come to her senses,” Adora said, “We’re saving Entrapta now.”

“Uh, not without me you’re not,” Scorpia asserted. It was daunting to have an eight foot woman staring them down, but Adora tried not to be intimidated.

“Scorpia, listen-” Adora tried, having found Scorpia to be surprisingly sensible in all their interactions so far. But Scorpia wasn’t listening, this time. Well, not that she wasn’t _listening,_ just that she wasn’t having it. Perfuma’s vines snapped as easily as a dusty cobweb and fell from Scorpia’s frame, attesting that the only reason she’d been caught and held was because she had _let_ them. 

“No, listen to me. I’ve left my home, I’ve made it through those awful, creepy woods and all their whispering, I’ve asked for help, I am _not_ going to just sit here while someone else gets Entrapta. I promised,” Scorpia seemed to tremble, just a moment, though it could have been a shiver in the moonlight. “I _promised_ I would go save Entrapta. So that’s what I’m going to do.”

At her side, the robot chirped, then whirred, then clicked four times and beeped twice.

“What, no, sweetie,” Scorpia knelt down and placed one of her large, beautifully spiked claws on top of the metal frame, “The horse whose name I think is Swift Wind-”

“It is!”

“-is going to have a hard enough time carrying the three of us, I’m not exactly small. There’s no way you’re gonna fit.”

The robot chirred and whirred again, followed by three sharp beeps.

“Could you maybe turn the volume down a little?” Adora hissed, anxiously glancing around.

“No, no, not even if I carry you, that’s too much weight.”

“Maybe if Swift Wind took two trips?” Bow suggested, chin resting in a bent finger.

“We’re not bringing Scorpia!” Adora hissed, gritting her teeth and clenching her fingers in Bow’s direction, which made him blink at her in mild surprise.

“I’m _coming_ with!” Scorpia asserted, rising to her feet again.

“Keep it _down!”_

“Scorpia and the robot can go first, and then I’ll come back for Adora and Bow!” Swift Wind said, proudly offering the solution.

“Shush! And why Scorpia first?”

“That’s the thing, Adora,” Swift Wind said, lowering his head so he could talk right next to her face and leaning a wing on her shoulder as though he had placed a teacherly palm there, “you have to be strategic about this. If Scorpia isn’t on the first trip, she’ll worry about us leaving her behind, and she won’t let us leave. You have to be on the second trip because you know I,” Swift Wind reared his head back, “Swift Wind!” he lowered down next to Adora again, “would never embark without you! Bow could go with Scorpia, but then you would have to carry the robot while riding on my back, and I don’t think you’re strong enough for that,” Swift Wind bent his other wing in front of his jaw and rubbed at it thoughtfully, “Unless you transformed into She-ra, but I wouldn’t suggest it. We’re trying to be sneaky here, Adora.”

Adora groaned and brought the heels of both palms up to her eyes. “Okay, okay, just, take Scorpia and Emily and go. Just go _fast_ and be _quiet!”_

“I’ll cover for you,” Frosta announced, firm but mercifully low volume. She smiled and lifted a thumbs up to Scorpia, who smiled back with open fondness and quickly enveloped Frosta’s tiny figure in a hug, then picked up Emily with seemingly no effort and mounted Swift Wind with just a little clumsiness, mostly encumbered by Swifty’s wings.

Adora watched them take off, feeling a little relieved to have the loudest members of the group mercifully out of earshot, but also irate, because of _course_ things wouldn’t go according to plan.

“You know what, I should. I should leave another note.” 

—

The ship was as functional as it was ever going to be. So Adora sat herself down in the pilot’s seat, Bow took up position at the helm, and Scorpia, Emily, and Swift Wind stood proudly flanking him, ready to go, tension and determination equally thick within the air.

…

“Should… I be doing something?” Adora asked, sheepish.

“I don’t know,” Bow said, equally chagrined, “Gotta be honest, I’ve never flown a spaceship.”

“I know how to fly!” Swift Wind supplied helpfully.

“Maybe there’s an on button?” Scorpia suggested, “I have found that most machines work better when you turn them on first, just, just saying, from personal experience.”

“Just have this thing flap its wings!” Swift Wind continued, “After the on button, hit the flapping wings button.”

Bow attempted to push Swift Wind away from the console, while Scorpia and Emily busied themselves looking for something that looked sticky-outy and important enough to function as the on switch.

“Wait, Swifty!” Adora tried as Bow repeatedly told him no, but it was a little late for that. Swift Wind face planted against the console, and to his credit, he _did_ push a button. The ship lit up, and Scorpia watched the lines of light trail across the mechanical hull, years of dirt and sand and loosened rust flaking off and falling from the interior of the ship at the sudden movement.

“Oo, pretty,” Scorpia said, pleased, as the ship hovered momentarily mid-air, and Bow and Adora shared a look of brief relief.

Brief, of course, because the next moment the ship took off like a shot, far too fast with no one ready for it. Everything that wasn’t Adora was slammed into the rear wall of the ship, Scorpia catching Emily before the little droid broke her ribs or ruptured her intestines or some such. 

“Nevermind! That wasn’t it!” Swift Wind hollered over the sound of movement and the three human screams. Bow tried to crawl his way back to the front, and Scorpia helped him, using her muscled claws to lift him so he could bang a fist against the console, stopping all acceleration. For a brief, wonderful moment, the ship hovered at the top of its arc, and then it tilted down, and resumed gaining speed.

“Down is the opposite of the direction we should be going!” Swift Wind yelled.

“I know that!”

“Bow, Scorpia, do something!” Adora called from the pilot seat, and Bow and Scorpia glanced at each other. In their brief moment of eye contact, they reached an understanding, and the two began wildly pushing any and every button within reach, doing _something_ alright.

“Loop de loops! How could you betray me?!” Swift Wind called mournfully as the ship was tossed recklessly in many directions. Adora struck her funny bone against a button on the armrest, and the ever familiar (but infinitely less annoying, this time) voice of a nameless hologram detected the administrator, and requested a query. 

“How to fly ship!” Adora yelled.

“Just take us back down!” Scorpia yelled, Emily enthusiastically echoing the sentiment in beeps.

_“Gently!”_ Bow clarified, louder than them all.

“Going in reverse,” the computer supplied, much to the screaming and panicked beeping of everyone on board. 

“Stop!” Adora called, and, thankfully, it did. “Okay, computer! Listen to Bow when he says things!”

“Temporary administrator access, granted. Please state navigational course.”

“Wait, if it took us back down, does that make Emily or I an administrator?” Scorpia asked, lifting the point of her claw to her chin thoughtfully. Emily beeped and whirred. “Oh, yeah, you do, don’t you? That’s probably why.”

“That’s why, what?” Adora asked, strands of hair hanging in her face, distressed out of her ponytail.

“Entrapta built her out of First Ones’ tech! Which is what the ship is made of. So I am also not an administrator, which, not gonna lie, I’m pretty okay with.”

“I hear you sister,” Swift Wind said, finally back on all four hooves.

“Please state navigational course,” the computer prompted again. 

“Uh, Beast Island,” Adora said, head whipping up to the screen, even though no visible hologram was present. There were too many things going on. And then the map was right there, right in front of her face, which was _another_ thing going on, and Adora quickly assumed her breathing exercises she’d learned in the Horde to keep from being overwhelmed in battle. It wasn’t a battle, but she found them helpful anyway. 

“Setting course for Hazardous Materials Disposal Site. Designation: Beast Island. Coordinates set. Is any additional assistance required?”

“Could you maybe, fly us there?” Adora asked, still piecing herself together from being tossed about like a uniform in a laundry machine while also dealing with the truly stunning experience of a computer actually doing what she’d asked, for once.

“Setting autopilot.”

“Wow, that was a lot easier than I thought it would be,” Bow said, hands and arms shaky where he braced himself on the console. 

Scorpia smiled at them all, “Yeah, just, had to fuss with it a little before it worked, that’s how things go in the Horde all the time!”

“No kidding,” Adora said with a laugh, more nerves than real humor, but the levity _was_ there. “I remember I had this glitchy baton once, I had to just use it as a club for like, three of the simulation targets before banging it around enough finally made it work again.”

Bow sank down, sudden, and hurled. “Aw, are you sea sick?” Scorpia asked, concern replacing her smile as she got closer and gently pat his back. “Or, well, space sick? Though, we’re not in space. Sky sick?”

“I’m good,” Bow said, lifting a shaky thumbs up, “I’m good, just, needed to do that. We’re good. Let’s go.”

“Initiating flight sequence.”

—

“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” Swift Wind asked, getting closer to Adora, who was peering out of the clouded window. Bow was keeping vigil at the hovering blue orb--which seemed to be some sort of global positioning system, just not one he could easily decipher-- while Scorpia and Emily sat against the back wall, side to side, watching the three of them with open curiosity, but no particular investment. 

“For the last time, I don’t know! We just have to trust that the navigation system knows where it’s going, now stop asking!”

“We’ve got to be close,” Bow said, zooming in on what he believed was their location, “any minute now, Beast Island is around here.”

“How do you know?” Scorpia asked, and she wasn’t second-guessing him. She reminded him of Entrapta, in that way, no judgement, just inquisitive. 

“I’m, I’m not sure,” Bow started, embarrassed to have to say that, “but I think this is us, and from what I remember of the map that showed up when we first set course…” Bow gestured at the space he believed Beast Island should be, “That would mean we’re almost on top of it.”

“Well, that’s great!” Scorpia said, and the tension in the room dropped a few degrees. Adora sat back in the pilot’s chair, Swift Wind’s feathers settling down flat again. “I wouldn’t say we have anything to worry about yet. I know this ship moves a lot faster than Horde transports, like, a lot faster,” Scorpia chuckled, gesturing around her, _”wow,_ but a transport takes most of the day to get out there, and wouldn’t get back to the Horde until the following afternoon. We’ve only been at this for, what, an hour? Hour and a half?”

“You’re right,” Adora said, smiling at her, and Scorpia smiled back, Emily beeping twice in a friendly sort of way. “I guess we’re all just, anxious. I mean, Beast Island.”

“I know, I can hardly believe it’s real,” Scorpia said, staring at the grey clouds. “I mean, the chibbits, with razor-sharp teeth…”

“Scruffers, with razor-sharp horns,” Adora added solemnly, hand absently rubbing at the wrist band of her sword.

“Razorfins, with—”

“Razor sharp fins?” Bow interrupted anxiously.

“Razor sharp teeth, actually,” Adora answered, “I don’t know why it had that name.”

“All those terrible things, and Entrapta’s just out there all alone…” Scorpia’s beautiful face was crumpled with guilt and worry, her hair hanging into her face while Emily beeped sadly and shifted on her metallic limbs. 

Bow and Adora shared a look, and Bow went to Scorpia, sitting down on her other side and placing his hand on top of her claw. “If anyone has the brains to survive out there, it’s Entrapta,” he said, gentle, firm, and calm. Scorpia offered him a weak smile, not reaching her eyes, and nudged into him with her upper body.

“She’s the smartest person I know. I— she’ll be fine.”

Emily whirred and chirped.

Scorpia snorted, “Yeah, yeah, that’s true!” She smiled again, and this time it was more convincing. “She always was…”

Bow smiled to see Scorpia feeling bolstered, even if he was missing half the conversation. He stood and left them to it, returning to the navitation orb. He stared at it, tension creeping back into him.

“Do you think Glimmer will still be upset when we get back?” he asked after a bout of silence. “I mean, we did sort of kind of completely disobey direct orders…”

“She’ll understand; we all want what’s best for Etheria. Once we have Entrapta back, Glimmer will know we made the right decision.”

“Right, right, but. I mean, what if she doesn’t? What if she never talks to me again?”

“Oh that’s not going to happen, no way,” Scorpia said, shaking her head and silvery hair catching the bluish light of the ship. “She adores you two, pun only slightly intended, Adora. Also, have you seen her, she’s like, always talking.”

“Okay but, what if she gets so mad at me she decides she hates me and banishes me from Bright Moon forever and tells me to pack all my stuff and leave but there’s no way I can pack _all_ of my stuff so she sets some of it on fire in the lawn and then I have to move back in with my dads? I love my dads but I can’t go back to living with them, I cannot do that we’re very different people and I get along better with them when I don’t have to see them frequently. And then I’d have to explain to them why I’ve been banished and they’d be so _disappointed_ and they’d keep bringing up how we were such good friends and they would be _right_ but then I had to _ruin everything_ and Etheria gets destroyed because I’m not there to help because you _know_ Glimmer doesn’t always check behind her on the left, and who’s going to be there to shoot arrows at the enemies approaching her from that direction? Not me! And everyone’s going to die and—” 

“Bow!” Adora yelled, slamming her hands down on his shoulders, “None of that is going to happen!”

“Uh, so, not to interrupt. Important emotional moment, I get it,” Scorpia said, trying to make herself smaller and less imposing, which was mostly a failed endeavor given how large and imposing she was just at base, “But is the red flashing something we should be, uh, worried about?”

Bow and Adora both turned to the navigation orb, which was, in fact, blinking red. 

“I’m sensing something!” Swift Wind announced, then rapidly lost bravado, “Something big. And not good. And. I think I also hear—” 

The ship suddenly rocked with heavy turbulence, many alarms joining in with the red orb.

“Nobody panic,” Bow ordered, grounding himself at the console and surveying the situation. Beyond the glass, past the parting clouds, Beast Island came into view. “Nevermind! Everybody panic!” Bow shouted, pulling Adora and Swift Wind in, who pulled in Scorpia and Emily, respectively. Screaming and shrill beeping filled the ship alongside all the alarms, before the ship settled itself gently into the waters just off the shoreline of the island.

“...Oh.”

—

“Okay, Emily, you stay here,” Scorpia said, kneeling down in front of her and patting her on top of her hull. “There’s a lot of weird stuff out there and I don’t want you getting caught in a root or getting damaged by a chibbit or something else. Also, please keep an eye on the door, okay? Don’t fight anything if it tries to enter, I don’t want you getting hurt, but keep a record so we can shoo out any beasts before we leave, alright?”

High, cheery beeping, and Scorpia stood with a salute. “Atta girl! Don’t worry,” she added, smile softening, “we’ll be back with Entrapta soon.”

“Adora!” Swift Wind called from the shoreline, and Adora and Scorpia hastened out of the ship. They’d taxied in so it was resting on the sand, and the boys were already cautiously exploring the first visible portion of the island. 

Swift Wind was nudging at a ruined Horde skiff, which had strange, one-eyed, tailed bugs crawling around on it. Beneath a ruined panel, there was Entrapta’s mask. Strange, almost-vines were grown over it, but they weren’t quite like the plants that any of their group was used to. Scorpia lifted the mask gently, staring at the cracked pink glass and her cracked reflection in them. The vine like things were shriveled, withered, missing whatever life source they’d had when they’d grown onto it.

How long had they had to grow?

How long had Scorpia left her in this place?

“Is anyone else hearing that noise!?” Swift Wind asked, side-stepping anxiously.

“Huh?” Scorpia asked, gaze tearing away from the metal in her hands. 

“What noise?” Bow asked.

“It’s gone, now,” Swift Wind said, looking around himself with wide eyes, “You didn’t hear it?”

“Uh… any scary Horde bedtime stories about noises only horses can hear?” Bow asked.

“Not that I can remember,” Adora said.

“Oh, there’s the one about the hypnotist princess,” Scorpia supplied, gently setting the mask against the ruined skiff, “Who broadcast her secret messages to the animals in the area and mind controlled them into attacking unsuspecting Hordesmen!”

“Right, the princess theme again,” Bow said, settled by the memory of spooky ghost stories and the fact that nothing had really been all that bad, in the end. And Glimmer, and Adora, and Swift Wind and him all getting along and solving problems together.

“Theme?”

“Ever notice how like, all the spooky stories they told us, except for the Beast Island one, involved some kind of horrifying princess?” Adora asked.

“Yes, actually, I did notice that. It did a real number on my self esteem as a kid, I’ll tell you that.” 

Awkwardly, the four of them stared at each other for a moment, and then Scorpia gave them all a bright smile, “Fortunately, I’m very strong, and I am totally over that now! Let’s go find Entrapta.”

“I heard the same sound earlier,” Swift Wind persisted as they resumed walking, inward, into the tall spires and neon lights, “Right before Mara’s ship crashed, when Bow was talking about Glimmer hating him forever.”

Bow whimpered, and Swift Wind’s feathers ruffled. “There it was again! Shorter this time.”

Bow looked at the scenery around him. “This… this is all First One’s tech,” Bow said, focusing on that. “But it’s corrupted, melted down. This must have been some kind of First One’s dumping ground.”

“Yeah, the ship said that,” Scorpia said, “Hazardous Materials Disposal Site, remember?”

“I think I was busy throwing up, right then,” Bow joked. 

“No, that was after the computer stopped talking,” Scorpia said, lifting her claw to her chin. 

Adora stared at the twining, melty spires and waves of ruined, ancient technology, rubbing at the runestone on her arm. Somewhere in the distance, a creature roared.

Swift Wind began anxiously singing. Scorpia was the only one who wasn’t particularly bothered by this fact. Around them, as they walked, things hissed and chittered, low moans like whale song reverberating from the distance, the flap of far-off wings falling around them. Then, quite suddenly, the animal noises stopped. This included Swift Wind’s song. Scorpia also stopped in her tracks, dropping to a fighting stance, tail raised. 

“Maybe everything went quiet… for a good reason?” Swift Wind suggested, even though he felt the _bad bad bad bad_ the strongest out of all the group.

Blue bioluminescent eyes opened.

The monster roared. 

“For the Honor of Grayskull!” Adora shouted, forming her sword and holding it aloft. The runestone flickered, like it had when she’d first acquired it, and everything was so difficult and confusing. And, like that early time, Adora did not transform. 

“Uh, Adora!?” Bow called as the thing approached. 

“I got this!” Scorpia said, vaulting over a strangely textured goopy root. “That thing’s eyes are huge!” Scorpia shouted at them, tail waving threateningly behind her. “I can leave it half blind and unconscious, easy-peasy!” 

It lunged, and Scorpia caught its mandibles with her claws, striking with her tail, but it was fast. Faster than Scorpia, whose massive strength came at the cost of speed and dexterity. It dodged her first strike.

“Why can’t you be She-ra?” Bow shouted, voice cracking and high.

“I don’t know!” Adora shouted back, panicked, staring at the sword in her hand with eyes blown terror-wide. 

“Seriously, no one else hears that sound?” Swift Wind shouted much louder than the other two, as though he could barely hear himself. 

Scorpia grunted as the thing attempted to crush her with its massive forelimbs. “Cadets! In line!”

Subconsciously, without a single thought, Adora was on her feet and over the root she and Bow had been crouched behind. Swift Wind jerked forward also, the glow of his and Adora’s sacred bond flashing briefly in his eyes before he remembered what was happening and resumed cowering. 

“Ranged fighters, get high and shoot at vulnerable spots! Cadet, on me! I just need this thing to hold still long enough for me to sting it somewhere soft!” Scorpia barked. The other three could hardly recognize her. The soft-hearted, sweet girl who came to them with shy questions of friendship and a dislike for kale was entirely gone. This was Force Captain Scorpia, a woman on a battlefield, and by god they _listened_ to her. 

Bow’s arrows did little against the hard shell of the monster, and it was keeping its eyes well protected. Adora gave as much backup as she could, but two decades of daily training were the only things keeping her on her feet. Why couldn’t she form She-ra? What if she never formed her again? Was it the island? The weird noise Swift Wind kept talking about? Was something wrong with her? Why?

“Adora, focus!” Scorpia shouted, “We just need this thing to get backed into enough of a corner—” 

A purple blast hit the thing in the face, and it turned to assess its new aggressor. Some shirtless humanoid in a cloak descended from wherever it was he’d been, and with a bulbous staff he summoned a purple rope which tied around the thing’s massive foreleg. 

“I can’t hold it long!” he shouted, voice raspy and cracking with disuse. Scorpia lunged, tail whizzing through the air, and finally caught the thing in the eye. It sank like a boulder and shook the ground when it landed. 

“Who is that guy?” Adora asked Bow, who’d joined her at her side.

“Hi there! I’m Scorpia, who are you?” Scorpia asked jovially, approaching the dude with a broad smile like he wasn’t some strange and unknown island entity, himself. He jerked back, leveling the staff at her, and the swift motion caused his hood to fall back.

Bow and Adora gasped. “King Micah?” Bow breathed. “But, but you’re—” 

“Your Majesty!” Adora exclaimed gleefully, jogging to Scorpia’s side and bowing. 

“Oh, oh, okay, big important hotshot, bowing now, got it,” Scorpia said, also dipping, her tail forming a cute little arc behind her. 

“It’s so good to meet you! In reality, this time,” Bow said, joining them and bowing as well. 

“You, you know me,” Micah said, retracting his staff and observing the true spectacle of a winged, horned horse bowing. “Ha, that’s incredible! Oh, please don’t bow, I”m no king here.”

“Of course we know who you are!” Adora said.

“Quick interjection,” Scorpia said sheepishly, raising her claw, “I do not.”

“Oh, right, uh, this is King Micah of Bright Moon,” Adora said, gesturing to him, and then the rest of them in turn, “I”m Adora, this is Scorpia, Swift Wind, and Bow.”

“King Micah, it’s so—” Bow started, before Micah gave him a very fatherly pinch to both cheeks, tugging on them a little in a way that had Bow vividly remembering Castaspella, “Uh.”

“Apologies,” Micah said, releasing Bow in a rush. “It’s been quite some time since I’ve had anyone else to talk to.”

“I get it, I get it,” Scorpia said with a nod, “Personal space is hard, especially when you’ve been lonely lately, I totally understand that.”

“Yeah, I just,” Micah’s eyes darted to the side, blown wide a brief moment, “Have to make sure you’re real. You are real, right?”

“Yup, very real,” Bow said, sweating as Micah attempted to pinch him again. “How about you? We kind of thought you were dead.”

“If the Horde had their way I would be,” Micah said, voice gone low, long hair tossing dramatically as he turned his head and stared at stage left. “They exiled me here, but I survived.”

Adora and Scorpia shared an anxious glance, Scorpia feeling the skin of her back prickling as she was very forcefully reminded that she’d never gotten any chance to change. She would uh. Maybe keep him in front of her while they walked?

“King Micah, we’re from Bright Moon. We know your daughter, Glimmer,” Adora said, smiling. “Bow’s the Master Archer of the rebellion, and Scorpia and I are ex hordesmen who now fight for the name of righteousness.” 

Scorpia’s lips pressed thin at that. She, she wasn’t—whatever, it didn’t matter, it was better than having Glimmer’s dad attempting to magic her to death for her shirt. 

“You know my sweet Glimmer?” Micah asked, everything about him taking a softer edge. He lost a few years, the hard lines of his island body sanding down, tension bleeding. Then a distinctive chitter sounded from the forest, and the moment was gone. He was wild-eyed, tense, and aged by isolation once again. “No time for pleasantries, we need to go, now!”

He took off like a shot and the four of them scrambled after them. He jumped and weaved deftly through the terrifying forest of wild roots and wilder technology, agile and fast. Adora could keep pace fairly well, but Swift Wind struggled with his hooves and Bow was unused to the terrain.

“Why! Is! Every! One! So! Fast!?” Scorpia huffed out, gulping down deep breaths between each word. When Micah finally stopped, she bent over at the waist, claws on her kneepads. Micah drew a circle in the dirt, filling the space with a gentle lilac light. 

“We should be safe here for the moment. A quiet, restful mo— AH!”

“AH!” the four shrieked back, jumping as Micah lunged for the bug he’d spotted. They stared at each other, Micah’s mouth hanging open with the bug hovering just a breath from his lips.

“Oh, where are my manners? Bug, anyone?” He extended it to them, and Adora and Bow turned it down as politely as they could. 

“Uh, maybe later,” Scorpia said, staring at it, “That things tail looks a little like mine, which, okay, I gotta admit, has me kind of curious, I’m not going to lie.”

“Dude.” 

Scorpia turned to Swift Wind, uncomprehending. 

Micah crunched loudly on the bug in his mouth. “So, what brings you kids to Beast Island?”

“Entrapta,” Scorpia said instantly, gone sober, mood turning half-desperate and aching. “My, our friend, Entrapta, she’s got long purple hair and she’s so short you could just pick her up and carry her everywhere without ever getting tired and when she gets excited her eyes light up in a way that makes you feel like you know what stars could look like and—”

“Any chance you’ve seen her?” Adora asked, before Scorpia had too much of a chance to work herself up. 

“Yeah, I know of her. She stole my rations,” Micah said bitterly, “Only the tiny ones for some reason,” he said, much less upset. 

“That’s great!” Scorpia shouted, claws coming up in front of her and tapping together with delight. 

“I mean, not the food part, but you’ve seen her!” Adora said.

“And you had some tiny food, which means she isn’t starving!” Scorpia added.

“She’s okay!” Bow said, “Or she was, not long ago.”

“Did you see which way she went?” Swift Wind asked, pushing his snout into the space between Bow and Adora.

“Well, yes, wait, _is that horse talking?!”_ Micah shouted, clutching Bow close to him by the neck.

“...I can hear you. I called Scorpia weird for wanting to eat the bug.”

“Wait is that what you were doing?” Scorpia asked. 

“I am Swift Wind!” he announced with a toss of his mane, ignoring Scorpia and flaring out his wings, “and—” 

“He has wings!”

“Oh, wow, you are definitely Glimmer’s dad,” Swift Wind said, unimpressed. 

“Your Majesty,” Bow wheezed, “I can’t breathe.”

“Oh, sorry, sorry,” Micah said, releasing him. “Like I said, it’s been a little while since I’ve talked to people. Or horses.”

“Man, I totally get you, I am so there. It’s hard to remember your own strength!” Scorpia said empathetically. 

“So, is the horse talking… normal?” Micah asked her, looking at Swift Wind and then looking back at Scorpia like he wasn’t quite sure who he should be addressing here. 

Swift Wind levelled him a _very_ unimpressed look.

“You were saying something about Entrapta?” Adora prompted.

“Just this horse,” Scorpia whispered, which wasn’t very quiet but it hardly mattered. “But yes, Entrapta.” Scorpia’s precious face crumpled again, concern written on every line of her body. Her voice was softer, vulnerable, when she asked, “Do you know where she is?”

Micah felt a little guilty for being the one who had to tell her. “Your friend headed straight to the center of the island before I could stop her.”

Scorpia smiled. “That sounds like her.”

“Could you point us in the direction-?” Bow started, but Micah whirled and grabbed him and Adora by the shoulders.

“You can’t go there! You’d never come back. That’s where the Signal is the strongest.”

“The Signal? That must be the noise I’ve been hearing,” Swift Wind said, relieved that someone else could hear it too. 

“You’ve heard it? Then we have to hurry. This place is a mass of ancient tech, mostly degraded, but some of it still works. Something at the center of this island never stopped signaling. The Signal dulls your resolve, exposes your vulnerabilities and preys on your weaknesses in order to pull you in. Everything that stays on Beast Island becomes a part of it eventually.”

“Why can’t Adora, Scorpia and I hear it?” Bow asked, as Scorpia thoughtfully rubbed a claw over her chin. 

“If you stay here long enough, you will.” Micah stared out into the glowing forest, right hand white-knuckled on his staff. “I’ve heard it every day, for months, years… I have no sense of time here.” His eyes snapped back to them, wide and wild once more, “But I fight it! Nothing will stop me from getting off this island and reuniting with my family!”

Scorpia’s tail swished behind her, her eyes going out into the forest, inland, towards the center.

“But enough about me, tell me about the rebellion and Bright Moon. And my baby girl, you said you know her?”

“Glimmer? Sure,” Adora said, “She’s,” the memories rushed back, and Adora faltered, “She’s…”

“She’s our best friend,” Bow said, all the love he felt for his friend of so many years present in his voice, in his eyes, “We’re the best friend squad.”

Scorpia and Swift Wind felt their attention drawn outward, towards the shore, though they both still listened.

“That sounds just like my baby girl. Always in such a hurry to grow up and make friends with the older kids,” Micah said fondly, and Bow and Adora shared a confused look.

“Not to interrupt, but—” Scorpia started, and the shriek-clack of multiple creatures all at once cut her off, sending everyone into battle stances, Bow’s bow in his hand and arrow knocked. 

“What is that?” Bow asked.

“We need to keep moving!” Micah announced, scuffing the circle he’d drawn with his heel and putting out the light. “I’ll help you find your friend. And then, will you help me escape this place?”

“Of course!” Bow said, “We’re all getting off this Island, together.”

“Now!” Scorpia shouted, physically picking up Adora and shoving Micah forward, while Swift Wind headbutted Bow, horn dangerously close to his skin, “We need to go, now!”

— 

“You are… very strong,” Micah commented, once they were far enough inland that Scorpia and Swift Wind had calmed from their jitters.

“Hm? Oh,” Scorpia set Adora down, “Sorry, Adora, forgot I was carrying you, heh.”

“Oh, no, I didn’t mind!” Adora assured, shooting a quick, dirty glance at Micah.

“So as I was saying, about how horses get chairs in the war room?” Swift Wind continued, recapturing Micah’s attention, “We also get unlimited sugar cubes.”

Micah squinted at him, then shrugged. “Eh, sounds good to me.” He caught another bug, offered it to Swift Wind, and when Swift Wind mimed barfing, offered it to Scorpia. She took a tentative bite, chewed, and gave a little “Hm.”

“Better than the yellow-green ration bars, I’ll give it that,” Scorpia said.

“Yellow-green ration bars?” Micah asked.

“Standard Horde item. You get four brown, one yellow-green, and one grey ration bar per day. Two for each meal, but you can mix it up if you want. Force Captains get two grey and three brown, but the yellow-green are the _worst._ Apparently they have important nutrients but mostly they just taste awful.”

“I can’t believe Glimmer’s dad has been alive the whole time,” Adora said while they conversed, “I mean, a little weird, but that’s to be expected.”

“Glimmer will be so happy to see her dad again,” Bow said, clasping his hands momentarily, “She’ll have to forgive us for going against her orders, escaping Bright Moon, and taking Mara’s ship,” he said, lines appearing under his eyes as he remembered his deep seated anxieties. “Not that we did anything wrong, or need to be forgiven. I mean, Glimmer kept us in the dark.” Adora rubbed anxiously at the runestone that was apparently not working anymore. “Truth is, Glimmer hasn’t been a very good friend lately. We used to tell each other everything, and a year ago I would have bet my life on the fact, the _fact,_ that I could always trust her. But she’s been hiding things from us and we’ve been fighting so much lately. Can you even have a fight with a best friend and still be best friends?” he asked, voice cracking, “And don’t even get me started on Shadow Weaver! And—Adora, are you okay?”

“I just. Why can’t I be She-ra here? What if the sword is infected, again? What if Glimmer is right and I ruin everything? I just feel… useless.”

“Hey,” Bow said, grabbing her by the biceps and looking her in the eye. “You aren’t useless. We’ll figure this out. You’re still a hero, I’m still a tech master, Swift Wind is still,” they glanced ahead of them, where Swift Wind was tossing his mane for a particularly dramatic part of the story he was telling Micah and Scorpia, “Swift Wind, and Scorpia is still terrifyingly large and strong and sweet as a cupcake.” Ahead of them, Scorpia laughed, her spikes just making the shaking in her shoulders that much more obvious. “And now we’ve got Cool Sorcerer Dad helping us! And soon, we’ll have Entrapta, and then we’ll head back home and we’ll have the rebellion. We’ve got this, Adora, all of us together.”

Bow smiled at her, and slowly, Adora smiled back. “You’re right.”

“I always am,” Bow said with false bravado, placing his hand to his bosom and twirling his other one towards Adora. She snorted, and jogged a step so she could hip-check him. He chuckled and kept walking, and Adora smiled as she did too, but when she glanced back down at her arm, she stopped. Why was the runestone so green in this light? WHY couldn’t she be She-ra?

...and what was that sound?

She caught up with the group, the ambient noise of the beasts feeling louder, suddenly, and got in close to Scorpia.

“The Signal,” Swift Wind said, looking so much worse than he had just a few minutes ago, when he’d been jovially sharing heroic stories. “It’s getting stronger! Seriously, can no one else hear that? Still?”

“We’re getting closer,” Micah said, banging his palm against his ear. “Don’t let it distract you, and whatever you do, don’t listen to it. Tell me, what is she like, my Glimmer?”

“Stubborn,” Bow said, equal parts fond, exasperated, and angry, “Real stubborn.”

“She’s also brave,” Adora said, “And reckless.”

“Feisty,” Scorpia contributed, “She never backs down, and I’ve seen her win impossible situations just by sheer moxy.” Admittedly, Glimmer winning meant Scorpia had lost those particular situations, but eh.

“That’s great,” Micah said, fond and warm. “Oh, does she still have her favorite stuffed animal? The one I made for her, Kowl?”

“Oh, yeah,” Adora said, brightening, “She gave it to me right after I defected. It was supposed to help make me feel more at home.” Adora smiled, remembering when she’d been gifted it, the cloth worn and clearly well loved. Remembering all the times she’d anxiously held onto it when she was confused, in such a new place with all new rules she didn’t know yet, surrounded by strangers. “She’s also started to use your sorcerer’s staff,” Adora supplied, fondness in her heart, more eager to share with Micah.

“Isn’t that… y’know, kind of dangerous for a little kid?”

“Pft, good luck telling her that,” Bow said, “She’s not exactly in the business of listening to people these days, except for Sha—”

Micah held up a hand, chittering in the woods having him, Swift Wind, and Scorpia on high alert. Micah knelt down, and the others followed suit. 

“What is that?” Bow asked.

“It’s the pookas.”

“Oh, that sounds adorable!” Bow crooned. Scorpia and Adora looked back at him, shaking their heads in rapid little movements. A particularly loud chitter had Scorpia’s head whirling back around, claw extended protectively in front of Adora and Bow, tail raised. 

“Let me guess, more razor sharp scary things?” Bow whispered, and Adora nodded.

“They travel in packs, hunting their prey across the island,” Micah said, voice low and quiet, “luring them in, surrounding them, until it’s too late. And right now they’re hunting us.”

Micah sent a light bomb into the forest, and hundreds of eyes blinked maliciously at them.

“Run!”

“I hate this place!” Scorpia shouted as she, once again, was made to run.

“Why did we come here without Glimmer!” Bow shouted as he ran, high pitched whoops coming from the beasts on their tails, “She could have teleported us out in a second! Why couldn’t she just trust us! Why couldn’t she trust _me?_”

“Glimmer’s in the field? She’s too young to be fighting, Angella shouldn’t have let her—” Micah caught the look Adora was giving him, and was silenced, something gone cold inside him. 

“Now might not, be the best time,” Scorpia panted, tail swinging at anything that got too close. She didn’t hit anything, but she kept quite a few from leaping. “But Catra may, or may not, have hired someone—!”

“You just focus on running!” Adora ordered. Micah caught her wrist.

“Tell me the truth! Glimmer’s not a little girl anymore, is she? How long have I been gone?”

The two of them were scooped up in large red claws. “Keep moving, and have emotional, moments, _later!”_ Scorpia shouted in gasps, skidding to a halt when the forest went suddenly, dreadfully silent.

“No no no no no no no,” Swift Wind muttered, head tossing and ears pressed flat, “Silence is always for a bad reason.”

Scorpia’s tail was twitching, swaying, jerking in little involuntary movements as she slowly lowered Micah and Adora back down to the ground, her chest heaving. 

A little greyish-blue, one-eyed creature dropped down in front of them.

“Aw, it’s kind of cu—” Bow started, only to be cut off by the sight of giant mandibles, a long tongue, and a mouth full of fangs. 

Bow shouted and the thing lept for him. He caught it and tossed it away, but there were so many more than just the one. Swift Wind kicked one with his powerful hindlegs and then bolted, whinnying and breying, acting on pure, horse-born, panic-blind instinct. 

“Swift Wind! Wait!” Adora called, running after him, and Micah, Bow and Scorpia were behind. There was a horrible, horrible noise, now audible to all.

“I’m here,” Adora said, slicing through strange vine-like things and approaching her steed, “Hang on, ah!” She covered her ear, wincing in pain.

“The Signal. You hear it too, now, don’t you?” Swift Wind asked with a hollow voice. The vines—which were definitely not actually vines—crawled up over him, twisting around him, ensnaring him. “It’s so loud… I can’t… think straight.”

“No no no, Swift Wind, Swifty, don’t lie down! Fight it!” Adora shouted, kneeling down beside him and slicing at the vines.

“We can’t stay! The Signal’s too strong!” Micah shouted. “The pookas cornered us right into a trap.” Bow covered one ear with the hand not holding his bow, balance going unsteady. Scorpia caught up, and, body heaving with every labored breath, looked back at the mass of blinking eyes that had followed them. “We have to move!” Micah shouted, and Bow dropped his bow, covering both ears. Scorpia’s attention snapped to him, eyes wide. But she was only startled. 

“Bow! Bow, not you too!” Adora shouted, leaving Swift Wind and rushing to him, trying to slice at the vines, only to be caught by the wrist with one herself.

“It’s too late, isn’t it?” Bow asked quietly, as Scorpia’s claws snipped through the vines like a knife through butter. “We couldn’t fix it.”

“These things, wow,” Scorpia laughed a little, smile painted on her face with near perfection. Only her eyes betrayed her. “They grow so fast, wow, okay, this is gonna take some doing.”

“King Micah, help Bow!” Adora shouted, Scorpia swatting away a vine that tried to sneak around her tail. Micah reached out, grabbing onto a vine on Bow’s chest, but he couldn’t do a thing to stop it. Scorpia snipped through it, but so many more were growing. 

“King Micah!” Adora shouted, the vines twining and twisting around him, too. She reached out and he clasped her hand, while Scorpia got to her feet and lifted Bow, clawing through all the vines between him and the ground. Airborn, she only had to fend off the ones coming from above. “Don’t give in now!” Adora shouted, “Not after all this time! We’ll get you back to Bright Moon! Glimmer needs you to come home and help her be queen and—”

“Queen?” 

Adora realized her mistake too late.

“If she’s queen then that means… Angie…”

“No, no! King Micah!” Adora whirled around, “Swift Wind!” she turned again, “Bow!”

Adora thrashed against the vines, looking to her last remaining ally. “Scorpia?!”

“Imagine a bottle,” Scorpia muttered, snipping and clawing at the vines that crawled towards Bow, “shove them all in. Push down your doubts and insecurities. Imagine a bottle and shove them all in. Push down your doubts and insecurities. Imagine a bottle—”

Scorpia grit her teeth.

“Scorpia! Don’t give up!” Adora shouted, despair crawling into her bones and vines crawling more boldly across her skin.

“I’m not,” Scorpia said, and the vines paused, a moment. “No one here is.”

With a yell, Scorpia turned and _yanked_ pulling Bow free from the vines by force. With heavy, bold steps she approached Adora, claws slicing and crushing anything between them, and lifted her, placing her on top of Bow. Micah was next, pulled upward by the vines dragging him towards the trees, Scorpia gathered them all like a ponytail and cut him free, a stringless puppet, and piled him on top of Adora. Finally, Swift Wind, in her free arm, she hoisted and with a mighty shout she pulled him from the vines. 

The chittering grew louder. Scorpia’s eyes were hard as ice. 

Scorpia did not run fast on a good day, much less weighed down by three people and a horse. But she set the pace, this time, with the Signal blaring in Adora’s ears, with the vines seeking to trip her every step, with the pookas screeching and flinging themselves at the group. Deftly, with the only fast part of her body, she stung, punctured, and clubbed each incoming pooka with her tail. Some of them cried out in agony. Some of them fell limp on impact. Some were unlucky enough to get pierced by that wicked stinger, and died.

Soon enough, with Scorpia ever advancing—Adora crying with fear, shame, relief—the pookas got the idea. Scorpia wasn’t as large as the thing that they’d fought earlier. She didn’t need to be. She was a monster in her own right, and the pookas fled.

An orange-tinted and acidic smelling stream was where Scorpia finally collapsed, the bodies she carried spilling out of her arms onto the bank.

“Scorpia,” Adora said, shakily, reverently. Scorpia looked at her, gasping for breath, and offered a trembling smile of her own. Adora placed her hand on Scorpia’s claw and Scorpia leaned in, exhausted.

“You saved us,” Adora said, Bow groaning and holding his head at her side. 

“What happened?” Bow moaned, Micah and Swift Wind also slowly, painfully coming to their senses. 

“Scorpia carried us out! She saved all of us.”

“Wow,” Bow said, sitting up heavily. “You know, I always manage to seem to forget that you were a Force Captain for a reason.”

“Everyone always does!” Scorpia complained, “I don’t get what’s up with that!”

“How did you resist the Signal?” Micah asked, staring at Scorpia with awe. 

“Oh, I’ve had like, two and a half decades of ignoring that kind of thing,” Scorpia said brightly, claws on her hips.

For a long moment, the only sound was Scorpia’s labored breathing and the distant noises of animals that weren’t yet close enough to hurt them.

“Dude,” Swift Wind said.

“What, I’m not trying to eat any bugs right now!” Scorpia said defensively.

“When we get back to Bright Moon, I am giving you _so_ many pillows,” Bow stated, and Scorpia frowned at him in confusion.

“I mean, it works. We’re alive,” Micah said. Scorpia looked at him, and nodded. 

“We’re going to have to think of another way to get to Entrapta,” Scorpia said, slowly standing as well. She had to lean on a tree for a moment. “Walking in directly might not exactly be working.”

“I… I don’t know how to express this to you, but after a Signal like that,” Micah said, staring at Scorpia with pained eyes, “I think that if your friend is further inland, that means she’s—” 

“She’s fine,” Scorpia said simply, confidently. “Don’t worry about that.”

“Scorpia,” Micah tried, gentle. 

“No, no, don’t you take that tone with me, buddy. Look, mister Micah king dude sir.” Scorpia placed her claw on Micah’s shoulder and gestured around them. “This island is _made_ of First Ones’ tech.”

“Most of it garbage.”

“Yes, yes, that is true, but still. This place is a gold mine for Entrapta, she’s probably having a great time even as we speak, and built herself some sort of way to block out the signal. Trust me. There’s no one on Etheria more likely to survive in this place. She’s fine. We just have to find a way to get to her.”

Adora nodded, Bow nodded as well but with less confidence.

“Okay, so, let’s look at what we know. Micah, Bow, and Swift Wind didn’t do too hot against the Signal.” Scorpia lifted her claw thoughtfully and her tail curled behind her. “Maybe Swift Wind, Bow, and Micah should stay here, away from the Signal, and Adora and I go get Entrapta ourselves? We were the only ones who held out.”

“I wasn’t doing too great at the end there, either,” Adora admitted, having needed to be carried as well.

“Well, yes, but if I’m just protecting you instead of like, three whole people and a horse, that’ll be way easier for me. All we’d have to really worry about is situations that involve running.”

“There is no way I’m letting you two go anywhere alone,” Bow stated firmly, and Swift Wind whinnied in agreement.

“Alright, so, not staying. Oh! Swift Wind, do you think… if you fly high enough, you might be able to avoid the Signal?”

“I was hearing it on the ship before we even landed, so no.”

“Darn, there goes the guardian angel plan.”

“Kids, kids, we _have_ to stay together. Getting separated means we might not be able to find each other again.”

“Right,” Bow said, nervous and high pitched. “So, we just try again, but this time we focus very hard on not thinking about how Glimmer was right and we should never have come here without her and how she might still be furious at us when we come back and—”

Adora smacked Bow on the back of the head, and the Signal stopped.

“Yes, Bow! We’re not thinking about that!”

“You can’t let this place distort your perceptions,” Micah said gravely. “It’ll twist everything out of proportion.”

“Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, that might be part of why I was able to get us out of there,” Scorpia said, “I uh, am starting to come to terms with the fact that I also have a tendency to twist everything out of proportion, but in the other direction. This island, hah, this island has a lot of untwisting to do before it can get to me.”

“Focus on the present,” Micah guided, hands on Bow’s shoulders, “Focus on what’s real. You are stronger than your insecurities. We can’t fix any of what you’re worried about right now, so save it for when we get back. Right now, you have to keep your mind on what’s happening currently, not what might or could.”

Bow took a deep breath, offered a small smile, and nodded, placing a hand on Micah’s shoulder in return. The two then turned to Swift Wind, wondering how they were going to get that message into the head of a magic horse.

“So,” Adora started, sidling over to Scorpia. “I just. Thank you,” Adora said, placing her hand on Scorpia’s claw. “Seriously, I really mean that. I don’t think we would have been able to make it out of there if you hadn’t been here.”

“Aww, don’t sell yourself so short,” Scorpia said, patting Adora on the back. “You’re She-ra! You always find a way to turn the situation around.”

“I’m not right now!” Adora said, eyes turning back to the runestone and feeling the knotting tension build again. “I can’t transform here! Everyone always expects She-ra to be able to fix things but She-ra is just _me,_ and I can’t!”

“Hey, hey,” Scorpia said, bending down to eye level and stroking her smooth exoskeleton over Adora’s spine. “Take a deep breath, okay, focus on me, breathe in.” Scorpia inhaled noisily through her nose, and Adora followed it. “There you go. Take it easy.”

“I just,” Adora said, face crumpling, “I want to. I want to be able to save everyone, but…”

Scorpia’s claw came down gently on Adora’s little hair poof and she said, “Hey, I get it. Sometimes you get really used to being the biggest and the strongest lady on the field and it all feels like your responsibility. And, I guess, I’m sorry for implying that it was, and sending you into this spiral, but listen. You’ve got Bow here, and Swift Wind, and even sir sorcerer. And me, too. We’ll have each other’s backs, and when you can be She-ra again, that’ll be that.”

“But we need She-ra _now!”_

“I mean, not really.” Scorpia shrugged and Adora gave her a frustrated look. “Okay, she would be helpful, sure, but between the five of us we’re doing pretty okay. Why does this bother you so much, anyway, I thought you had that whole _thing_ with destiny, and She-ra, and getting to, you know, _not_ be her?”

The part of Adora that had been raised in the Horde wanted to shut down that line of conversation really fast, but the part of her that lived in Bright Moon wanted to talk. And it was nice, having someone who wasn’t Bow, to talk to. 

“I. I want to be She-ra to protect people, not because some spooky hologram told me to.” Adora rubbed her wrist and glanced at Scorpia’s face, who was listening without judgement. “I haven’t been not-able to transform since I started this whole… everything,” Adora gestured vaguely, trying to encompass all that had happened to her since she first lifted the sword.

“It’s probably just the freaky First Ones’ tech, right?” Scorpia reassured.

“But what if it isn’t? What if it’s me?”

“How would it be you?” Scorpia asked, “I mean, what would even cause that?”

“I’m not good enough,” Adora said, immediately, bitterly, “I can’t do it.”

“I don’t think that’s right. If it was a matter of being good enough, then you’d have an easier time now, than when you started, since you’ve improved since then?”

“But what if I’m not the hero I’m meant to be? What if I’m not the hero I was?”

“I mean, you’re here, aren’t you?” Scorpia said, and Adora’s breath caught. “We’re saving Entrapta from the most terrifying place I’ve ever been, we’re all scared out of our minds, but we’re still here. Because our friend needs us, and we need to rescue her. Isn’t that, I mean, I’m not super familiar with heroism, but isn’t that heroic?”

“...Yeah,” Adora said, looking back at her wrist. “Yeah, I guess so.”

Scorpia lifted the point of her claw to her chin. “You said you haven’t had trouble transforming since when you first started out. What’s the same between then and now?”

“...I’m scared,” Adora admitted, “Not of Beast Island—well, yes, okay, definitely of Beast Island—but of… myself. Of not being good enough, of not being able to protect people, or be the hero I want to be. I’m scared I let Glimmer down, and, and that. That I let Angella down, too. She… she told me to take care of Glimmer. To take care of everyone. And I want to,” Adora said, grabbing onto Scorpia’s arms and hanging her head, “I want to, so much, but every time someone gets hurt I, I feel like I’m letting her down, and…” Adora choked off as Scorpia slowly pulled her into a hug, tears stinging her eyes. She pressed her face into Scorpia’s shirt, trying to fend them off.

She remembered that moment. In the portal. When Angella had gently kissed her forehead and told her, “Take care of each other.”

She remembered Glimmer and Bow, with their arms around her, welcoming her to Bright Moon. Frosta, eagerly and earnestly attempting to make sure Glimmer had a good day. Perfuma and Mermista and Sea Hawk, always there to watch their backs. Spinnerella, Netossa, The General, all the people they’d saved and all the people they’d help save themselves.

Scorpia’s arms were warm and strong around her, but she pulled back, and looked over. There were Bow, Swift Wind, and Micah, working together, helping each other.

“But I’m not in this myself,” Adora said quietly. She looked up at Scorpia, who was staring at her curiously, but quietly, letting Adora follow that thought. “We’re supposed to take care of each other. As long as I’m with you, with the others, all I need to do is…not give up.” Adora’s face set in determination. “And I won’t. Not on you all, not on Etheria, and. And not on myself.” 

The runestone glinted, and she felt a warm shiver.

“Ooooh, is it sacred bond time?” Swift Wind asked, butting in loudly. Whatever conversation the boys had had, it seemed to have worked. Swift Wind looked—and felt, through their bond—much better.

“I think so,” Adora said, smiling at him. She transformed the sword back into a blade, and held it aloft.

“For the Honor of Grayskull!”

The magic fit over her as a second skin, familiar and warm and _relieving._ She smiled at Swift Wind, Bow, and Scorpia. 

“She-ra?” Micah asked, mouth open in disbelief.

“It wasn’t the island that stopped me from being She-ra,” Adora said, looking down at the reflection in her sword, and then back up at her friends. “It was me. I was so afraid of what Glimmer said—that all I’ve ever done was make things worse. But I promised I would take care of her.” Adora smiled at them. “All of you. And I will.”

“So, you’re a legendary warrior, my daughter is queen, and horses can talk,” Micah listed off.

“I know, it can be hard to believe sometimes,” Scorpia said, patting him on top of his wild hair. 

“There’s a lot we need to catch you up on, Your Majesty,” Adora said sympathetically. “But first, let’s save our friend.”

The second attempt went better than the first. The Signal was quiet, this time around, and She-ra’s presence set them all, well, not at ease, but they were definitely feeling more confident. Scorpia hadn’t run far, only far _enough,_ so it wasn’t too long before they were back where they were, and then past that. 

Micah was right, it was hard to judge time, on this island. Some amount of time passed, maybe half an hour? And then Scorpia stopped. “Wait, do you hear that?”

“Things are getting… quieter, here,” Swift Wind said anxiously, but he didn’t _feel_ the wrongness himself. 

“No no,” Scorpia said, and a strange noise, not the signal, but not the chitter-chirp of a living creature either, was in fact approaching them. Scorpia’s eyes lit up. “It’s machinery.” 

Within a few more moments, the ground was thudding with weight, and a giant robot, twice the height of She-ra, came into sight. It had massive, heavy limbs, a wide, purple-tinged glass lid, and decaying acidic tech-melt, grease, and the ooze of squashed insects and ruined plantlife covering its exterior. Scorpia rushed towards it as it opened its massive maw.

“Entrapta!” she called, as Entrapta lifted her new, bug-like face guard.

“Scorpia!” Entrapta answered back, flinging herself from the bot and landing directly in Scorpia’s open arms. Her purple hair—shorter, the ends ruined and dirty and splitting—twined around Scorpia, cocooning them together. “It’s so good to see you!”

“Oh, Entrapta, I’m so relieved, you’re okay!” Scorpia said, pulling back to look her in the face, one claw reaching up to gently stroke her cheek, checking her over. “Oh no! Your hair! Does it hurt you? Are you in pain!?”

Entrapta laughed, in that loud, mad, recklessly beautiful way of hers. “Of course not silly! Hair doesn’t have nerve endings in it!”

“But you have _magic_ hair!” Scorpia cried, gently setting Entrapta down and fussing over her, checking her over and eyes searching anxiously.

“This is true. Ohhhh could you imagine if I had more than just pressure sensors in my hair? If they could actually simulate tactile stimulation? Actually, no, that would be a horrible idea, I use the fact that my hair doesn’t feel pain to my advantage _way_ too often. But ohhh, what if it was like that?”

“Uh, guys? We’re kind of in the middle of a creepy nightmare forest,” Swift Wind interrupted, gaining glares from Adora, Bow, and Micah. It was touching, watching Scorpia and Entrapta reunite.

“Oh, sorry! Everybody hop in! Nothing bothers me when I’m in Joanne.”

“Awww, her name is Joanne?” Scorpia crooned. “Hi sweetie! Oh, thank you very much,” she said as the thing lowered to the ground, all the easier to climb into its mouth. Micah was less than jazzed about that.

“I can’t believe we’re all here on Beast Island at the same time!” Entrapta said enthusiastically, taking her place at the controls. Scorpia cuddled up close to her, delightedly looking down at her, oblivious to the forest and island surrounding them.

“This is… a tight fit,” Micah commented, Swift Wind’s butt right there. Right. Right there. Right in his face. God.

“We came here to find you,” Scorpia said, face falling from its smile. 

“Beast Island log, tide cycle 37,” Entrapta said, beeping her recorder, “I have confirmed that the outside world still exists! Scorpia, one princess, some sort of horse-bird hybrid, Bow and...” Entrapta sniffed at Micah curiously, then stated, “I don’t know you.”

‘Yes, you do,” Micah said, attempting desperately to keep Swift Wind’s butt just. Just a little further from his face. Why was it _right there?_ “You stole my food.”

“Oh yeah!” Entrapta said, remembering now, “It was delicious. Thanks!”

“Have you been eating enough?” Scorpia asked anxiously. She couldn’t really “get in Entrapta’s space,” with them all crammed together like that, but the way her body leaned in, close, focused on Entrapta like a compass pointing north, the safe assumption was that if they _had_ had space, she would be invading it. 

“More or less,” Entrapta said dismissively. “There are so many _fascinating_ things I’ve learned here!”

“Could you maybe move your foot an inch or so forward? You’re kind of digging into my skull there,” Bow said from his spot as Entrapta’s footrest.

“Oh, sure!” Entrapta glanced around, “Say, wasn’t there another one of you?”

“Yes, Glimmer! You know her!” Bow said, uncomfortable and a little exasperated. “And she’s,” he hesitated, “not here.”

“Can we talk about how I am not a bird,” Swift Wind said pointedly, horn waving dangerously at Scorpia as he got his face in close to Entrapta’s.

“Uh, hey, focusing, Entrapta,” Adora said, shoving her way forward, “We’ve been looking everywhere for you. Are you okay?”

“Of course I’m okay!”

“Good, because from some of the things you’ve been saying it sounds like you’re not really… remembering everything,” Bow said, brow knit together with concern. 

‘Have you seen this place?” Entrapta asked, as though Bow hadn’t spoken at all. “It’s an island full of technological monstrosities! Each more deadly than the last; it’s paradise!”

Scorpia laughed, “I knew you’d be enjoying yourself,” she said, but from the relief in her voice, she hadn’t really _known_ that. 

“Right, so, glad you’re having fun,” Bow said, having been stepped on with Entrapta’s excited wiggling and Micah pressing down on his shoulder, trying very hard to get away from Swift Wind’s rear, “but we kind of came here to rescue you?”

“Thanks! From what?”

“The island,” Scorpia said, “The monsters and, y’know, this place.”

“We would have come sooner,” Adora said, “but we had no idea you were here.”

The robot stopped moving, just a moment, and Entrapta glanced at Scorpia—ever so briefly, just a flicker of motion—before lowering her bug-like mask over her face. The robot resumed moving. 

“Entrapta, please, we discovered a terrible secret that no one else knows. We need your help,” Adora tried, as Scorpia stared straight ahead. Of course Scorpia had seen the glance. She hadn’t looked at anything but Entrapta since they’d found her.

“Oh!” Entrapta exclaimed, lifting her mask again with a smile. “You mean the Heart of Etheria? Please tell me this is about the Heart of Etheria. It’s so _fascinating!_ And awful, we’re all going to die. Come on, I have more data in my lab!” She surged the controls forward, sending Joanne into a sprint. 

— 

Entrapta’s lab looked like a mix between an old First Ones’ ruin, and a tattered hut befitting a stranded islander. Joanne waited across the boardwalk, too heavy to fit inside the lab herself, and the five of them followed Entrapta across. At the halfway point of the boardwalk, the Signal blared again, and She-ra’s presence wasn’t there to dull it. It was just pure, loud, all-consuming noise. Triggered by nothing and aiming to disarm them.

“I don’t like it here, the Signal’s getting louder again!” Swift Wind complained, wings fluffing up in rising anxiety. 

“Don’t worry, it’s better once we’re inside, come on!” Entrapta beckoned. “Oh, Scorpia, I’ve got to show you this one terraforming file I found, it explains so _much_ about the augmentations of your body and the bodies of all those lizard people who live in the Fright Zone!” she prattled cheerfully as the two led the way inside, Scorpia smiling at her once again and Entrapta’s mask up, eyes bright. 

Past the purplish foliage that blocked the entrance, they found themselves staring down a long, dark tunnel. “Come on!” Entrapta called from ahead, Scorpia pausing at her side to turn and look back at them. “You’re gonna love it!”

“Ohhhh, I do not love it!” Swift Wind whined when the plants fell back over the entrance, and Micah lit up the end of his staff, faint purple glow illuminating the hallway. 

“It’s better inside! There’s also a light source, though I’m not sure where it comes from. My current hypothesis is that the walls all emit a steady, low level of light so that anyone walking around in it will still be able to see, despite no notable windows or missing pieces in the walls!” Entrapta said, the space before her opening up into a relatively familiar layout.

“It really is,” Adora commented, looking around her, purple and bluish light meshing together, “It’s a First Ones Temple.”

“Isn’t it amazing?” Entrapta crooned from her perch on Scorpia’s shoulder, purple hair already pressing a rapid sequence of buttons and pulling up a large number of screens. “The First Ones tried to hide their secrets by dumping them on Beast Island! The answers I’ve been looking for, all the knowledge I’ve ever sought, it’s all,” Entrapta crawled forward on her hair, setting herself down at the console and staring up at the multilayered display, dozens of holograms lighting up the space, _”here.”_

Adora and Bow shared a look, and Bow opened his mouth to say something, but stopped, air caught in his throat. Scorpia’s expression…

“Entrapta?” Scorpia said quietly, staring, not at the screens, but at her friend, “You are… you are coming back with us, right?”

The Signal. It was sounding again, outside, loud enough to ricochet down the empty hallway and niggle at their ears. The sound of moving vines wasn’t quite loud enough to reach them. Yet.

“Oh, no, I can’t do that!” Entrapta said, joyous, even as Scorpia stared at her in open pain, “There’s so much here that I can learn! Everything, everything I’ve ever dreamed of knowing, it’s right here, I can access all of it! This place…” Entrapta said, voice going hollower, dreamier, as the Signal rose in pitch, “it’s pure information.” She placed her hands on the console, vines close enough to hear their slithering, now. “So, I’m staying.”

“Entrapta, no!” Adora called, but when she tried to rush forward, the vines got in her way. “We’re not going to leave you!”

The Signal could hardly be classified as a Signal, that time. More like a sonic blast, it shook the temple, it shook the people in it, Bow had to catch himself on Swift Wind to keep himself from falling. The vines surged, at Adora’s words, latching onto Entrapta almost too fast to see them. 

“Everything back there with the princesses,” Entrapta murmured, unaware of the vines’ touch, conversational, almost, “and then Hordak, and then Catra, and…”

Scorpia’s eyes widened, agony, guilt, and tears present in them. She knew what name went unsaid.

Entrapta raised her hands, not her hair, and lowered her mask, vines twirling up her legs. “It’s for the best. I belong here.”

Adora tried to call out again, but the Signal sounded, high, shrieking, and Scorpia waited until that particular whine stopped sounding before she moved. Adora, Bow, Swift Wind, and Micah could feel their panic building, hearts fast, breathing rapid, as the vines twisted and curled towards them, seeking to capture them also.

But Scorpia simply bent down, snipped the vines off that had attached themselves to Entrapta’s legs, cut away the ones crawling down from over the console screen to secure her head and hair, and tossed them all over the side of the boardwalk. She returned to Entrapta’s side, and knelt down, all her motions even, unrushed, deliberate.

“I’m sorry,” she said, and the vines, every single vine in that temple, stopped. “I’m sorry, Entrapta,” she said, a little louder, a little hoarser, the only sound outside of six heartbeats, five pounding. Scorpia could feel her heartbeat in her throat. “Entrapta, I… I thought Catra would change her mind. That she was just scared and panicking and that we would come get you, once the adrenaline wore off. I thought if I could just, help her enough, she would help me out, and we’d both help you. And then it could be the three of us again, back in action. I thought… I thought she was a better person than she is. And I ignored all the signs that she wasn’t. I.” Scorpia didn’t bother to wipe at the tears on her face as they started to drip, all her attention focused on Entrapta, one gloved hand held between two claws. 

“I let her hurt you. I let her send you here, telling myself you would be fine until she came around. I left you here and you deserved better. You deserved to have a better friend than me, but Entrapta, I promise, I will _never,”_ Scorpia hiccupped, head lurching forward, hanging, tears making sharp pricks of noise as they hit the metal floor, “never, let anything hurt you again.”

Slowly, Entrapta lifted her hand, and lifted the mask. Her eyes were still glassy, still unfocused, but they were directed at Scorpia. Then she turned her head back to the console, and the Signal began droning again, the vines wriggling once more.

“But… I finally have answers…” Entrapta murmured, hollow and lost. 

The vines weren’t crawling towards Entrapta, though at first they had seemed to. 

One wrapped around Scorpia’s ankle. 

“I finally have _all_ the answers…”

“Log date, 457,” Scorpia said, quiet, trembling, and Entrapta’s hollow gaze turned back. 

“What?”

“I know I’m not smart,” Scorpia said, ignoring the vines that slithered up her feet, that twisted onto her knees, “and I know I’m not perceptive, and that I mess up a lot. But I’ve got a really, really good memory. I have Force Captain orientation memorized almost verbatim, and I only attended once,” she tried to joke, but the small, short flicker of a smile was anything but convincing. “So just, trust me. Go to Horde Log 457. About two minutes in.”

Entrapta pulled out a voice recorder, then a second, then a third; they were marked 6, 5, and 4. She hit rewind on #4, pausing for brief moments.

_”date 468… log date 458… 56,”_ a switch in buttons, forward now, _”...yielded predictable results. All in all, a success, just not my most explosive one! Hahaha!”_

Scorpia’s voice came from the recorder, tinny and quieter, spoken from a distance.

_”Wait, if you expected that, then why even test it?”_

_“For the proof of it all! I could always be wrong, and I love to _learn_ about things!” Whirring, a beep. Emily. “There will always be stuff I don’t know, and that’s okay. I like figuring things out! So even though, sure, we could reasonably have predicted that the circuit wouldn’t close remotely, the scientific process is the fun part!”_

_“Even if you have the answer?”_

_“Even if I THINK I have the answer! And why would I want to just _have_ an answer when I can make one for myself? Discovery is the best part of all knowledge. At, least, to me, anyway.”_

Entrapta stopped the recording. The vines were the only noise for a long moment. Bow, Adora, Micah, and Swift Wind watched the two of them with baited breath, not sure if they should try to help, or if that would shatter the moment and send everything spiralling uncontrollably. 

“...I can’t be your lab partner. I can’t even be a very good assistant. I don’t know a lot of what you’re saying, when you get excited, but. But if what you said to me back then is still true now, then, can’t we… leave this?” Scorpia tilted her head towards the console, vines gripping the ribbing of her shirt and climbing. “Can’t we go out into Etheria and find the answers that way? Can’t we,” Scorpia looked down at Entrapta’s hand, so small, so very small, there between her claws, “figure it out?”

“I missed you,” Entrapta said simply. Scorpia’s head snapped up, in shock, in desperate hope. Entrapta’s eyes weren’t half so hollow, now. Tears filled them.

“I missed you,” Scorpia answered, voice high, breaking, tears spilling over once again as she lurched to her feet, vines snapping inconsequentially as she rose, as she scooped Entrapta up into her arms and held her tightly.

The Signal blared again, shaking the temple, sending Adora’s hands to her skull and Bow down onto his knees. But Scorpia and Entrapta stood, hair twined around Scorpia like the vines had tried to do, oblivious to the sound. The vines resumed their mission, something more sinister to the movements now, almost angry. Adora screamed and began hacking at them in panic, while Swift Wind whinnied and reared. Micah blasted at them, largely unsuccessful, while Bow knocked an arrow and tried to think of a target to shoot.

“No, no no no no no, hey!” Entrapta shouted, noticing how the vines were making cracks in the console, the displays she’d brought up flickering, glitching. “Don’t just break it! Noooo, no! Come on!”

“So, uh, also,” Scorpia said, smiling now, sniffing loudly and wiping at her face with one claw, the other still holding Entrapta, “we may have come to Beast Island on this massive First Ones’ ship, which I think is a spaceship, and it’s functional, and it’s _big.”_

“You came here on _what!?”_ Entrapta shouted, attention returning fully to Scorpia. There were stars in her eyes. “Really?”

“Yeah! Emily’s waiting for us there; she’ll be so excited to see you!” Scorpia said as the console beside her broke entirely.

“What are we waiting for! Let’s g—wait why is Emily with you?”

“Oh, she moved in with me after you got sent here! We’re buddies.”

Entrapta stared at Scorpia a long moment, lips slightly parted at the center, pupils blown wide. As though unconscious of the motion, Entrapta reached out and grazed her palm against Scorpia’s cheek, and Scorpia’s breath caught, paralyzed by the look Entrapta gave her.

“Let’s move!” Entrapta shouted, leaping from Scorpia’s hold and breaking the moment. But in a good way, a joyous way, as she danced over the vines.

“You’re coming!?” Adora asked, needing a moment, just a moment, to turn into She-ra and then she could blast these with her golden boom. 

“Yup, just let me, oh gosh these things are really growing fast in here, huh?” Scorpia asked, swiping them away as fast as she could. It hadn’t been who Adora was asking, but good enough.

“Do you think you can get me away from these things long enough to turn into She-ra?” Adora called, asking either Scorpia or Swift Wind.

“Sure, here!” Entrapta said brightly, splitting her hair and lifting Adora up. Again, not who she’d asked, but good enough.

“For the Honor of Grayskull!” Adora called, and then sank her sword into the path.

To her credit, it did get rid of the vines and the Signal.

Unfortunately, this was a very old, structurally unstable temple.

“Uh, guys?” Bow screamed, voice cracking. A piece of falling debris caught Micah in the leg, causing him to cry out in pain. He could stand, but running would be a challenge, now. A challenge they didn’t have time for.

“Oh gee, okay, let’s go,” Scorpia barked, tone taking that commanding edge she’d whip out when she needed it. She grabbed Entrapta, who giggled delightedly, and hoisted up Micah as well, Swift Wind whinnying as Adora mounted and grabbed Bow. Entrapta whistled, high and shrill. Swift Wind couldn’t fly high, on Beast Island, but he could clear some distance, and Joanne met Scorpia, Entrapta, and Micah at the foliage over the entrance, grabbing them all inside her thick, impressive hull and keeping them safe as they fell down the sharp cliff.

“This is a lot better without a horse butt in it,” Micah mentioned, a few moments after they landed, the three of them getting their bearings. Swift Wind landed close by, and Adora and Bow dismounted.

“Alright,” Adora said, ready to have things back under her control, just a little. “Let’s head out. The sooner we get off this island, the better, I’m not gonna lie.”

“That’s what I’ve been saying this whole time!” Swift Wind complained.

“Bye, Joanne,” Entrapta said mournfully as Micah climbed out, “I’ll come back for you! I promise!”

“Uh, Entrapta? The ship is big. Like, _big,”_ Scorpia mentioned as Bow helped Micah onto Swift Wind’s back. “Joanne will definitely fit.”

“Nevermind I’m taking you with me! Let’s go!” 

Joanne’s giant mechanical mouth closed around Entrapta and Scorpia, shutting the two in, and the other four just sort of let that happen. They’d witnessed some, well, fairly private emotions between the two, and it was gonna be kinda hard to look either of them in the eye, for a little while. 

“Let’s go,” Adora said with a wave, and they all started moving. And with Joanne along, significantly less critters bothered them on the way out. The Signal made a few more attempts, beckoning them back, beckoning them to despair, but they resisted, and they made it to the ship all in one piece.

“It’s,” Entrapta shouted, opening Joanne’s mouth, “BEAUTIFUL!”

She hopped out and ran ahead of the group, delighted, no, elated, no, exuberant, no, someone invent a new word, quick, to describe how excited she was. Happy beeping from the entrance took Entrapta’s attention away from the exterior of the ship, and then she was running with more purpose, right to her precious bot.

“Emily! It’s so good to see you!” she cried, flinging herself onto her <strike>daughter</strike> finest creation and hugging her tightly. Emily beeped and whirred and chirped at her, and Entrapta pulled back enough to smile into her viewport.

“Did you take care of Scorpia while I was gone?” she asked her softly, and Emily beeped affirmatively with a nod of her hull. “Atta girl. Aww, you got scratched up while I was gone,” Entrapta crooned, rubbing at the claw marks, “That’s okay! Nothing a little soldering can’t fix.” Entrapta gasped, peering behind Emily into the ship. A wordless, elongated cry of delight whistled out of her, and Bow placed his hand on her shoulder with a knowing smile. 

“I have temporary administrator access,” he mentioned with a smile, “Want me to show you how things work?”

“Could you, possibly, you know, get us set on a course for home first, and do the geeky science thing together on the ride there?” Adora suggested, trying not to sound impatient.

“Right! Right,” Bow said, and cleared his throat. “Ship! Take us home to Bright Moon.”

A map appeared, and it locked onto Bright Moon’s location before blipping away again.

“This is actually real,” Micah said, staring around him. “This is real, right? We’re going home?”

“Yes,” Bow said, allowing his cheeks to be pinched again, “Remember how we already did the pinching thing?”

“It’s just so hard to believe, I mean, we’re really going home. And this horse really talks?”

“What’s this button do? I’m gonna push it and find out!” Entrapta yelled suddenly, and Swift Wind and Adora yelled at her, trying to usher her away from the console. 

“That one makes evil loop de loops!” Swift Wind shouted, feathers raised.

“Maybe push random buttons AFTER we’ve left the terrifying spooky island?” Adora tried, right eye twitching.

—

They landed the ship not far from Bright Moon proper, just far enough to avoid crushing anything important. Scorpia was glad for that, and tried not to show how obviously she went towards the castle, with its fancy spare rooms and ridiculously comfortable beds that even her tail fit well in. Adora and Bow balanced Micah on Swift Wind, and if Emily weren’t keeping an eye on her Entrapta might not have left the ship, too fascinated, excited, and enthralled.

It had been a long… day. Week. Months. Life. Scorpia was tired.

“Scorpia!” Glimmer said, too quiet to be considered yelling but too impassioned to not be. She’d appeared at Scorpia’s side in a blink of magic, and Scorpia barely grabbed onto her own tail in time to stop it from stinging her. In that time, Glimmer had grabbed her and teleported them back into Bright Moon. “I need your help!”

“Okay, I know I”m new here but you all have _really_ got to stop startling me like that!” Scorpia whined, voice breaking a little. “When I’ve had a full night’s sleep I’m pretty decent at tamping down the instinct to sting, but I’ve barely slept lately and my control just drops and I could _really_ hurt one of you!” Scorpia shook her head. “I’m sorry, sorry. I didn’t mean to yell. I’m just tired; you need to find someone else to help you.”

“Scorpia, come on, you were a Horde soldier, this can’t be the longest shift you’ve ever pulled,” Glimmer said decisively, staring up at her with hard eyes.

And, well, it was true. Scorpia remembered back to when she was 16, her first time thrown onto the battlefield. The first princess alliance had stretched the Horde’s resources thin, and there were too few soldiers so some of the most promising of the cadets had been selected to go out and join the battle. 

Scorpia had been a one woman army—well, one girl army, as it was. The battle raged on for 72 hours, and Scorpia had slept for none of it, driving the princesses back, their faces horrified, like she was some monster from a bedtime story, like her face was familiar to them. It had been the longest, hardest thing Scorpia had ever done. Sure, she’d just gotten back from Beast Island, and yeah, she’d barely slept in the Whispering Woods, too desperate to get Entrapta back, too driven by her quest to find the elusive Bright Moon despite the shifting landscape. But, she _had_ slept _some,_ so…

“What is it that you need?” Scorpia asked quietly. 

“The Horde is on their way here and you’re the key to stopping them!” Glimmer stated.

Scorpia’s face widened in horror, cradling her tail close to her chest, stepping back, away from Glimmer. “Glimmer, no, I. I know I left the Horde but I can’t—I can’t hurt any of them. Leaving is one thing but fighting them?”

“Scorpia, listen to me,” Glimmer said, hands going to Scorpia’s biceps and Scorpia clutched her tail that much closer, alarmed by how close Glimmer’s face was to it. “Hordak and Catra have sent a signal out to a giant space army, which Hordak used to be a part of. If they get here and we aren’t prepared, they’ll hurt us all! Please, listen to me, Scorpia. If we do this, it means we save _everyone.”_

Catra, laughing in the Waste. Lonnie, Rogelio, Kyle, chatting on the deck of a ship. Scorpia’s own cadets. The woman she’d just saved.

“Everyone?” Scorpia asked, small, vulnerable.

Glimmer softened. “We both want to save the people we love,” Glimmer said, thumb rubbing absently at the seam between skin and exoskeleton, “But I can’t do it without you.”

“...What do you need me to do?” Scorpia asked, though it pained her to say it.

“We won’t be engaging with the Horde forces directly,” Glimmer assured. “What we need to do is get you to the Black Garnet so you’ll connect with it. Then, the planet will be balanced, and we will _finally_ be able to stop this, once and for all. Stop _all_ of this!”

“I…” Scorpia looked conflicted, “I can’t… the Black Garnet, it’s never worked for me. It just, doesn’t want me. I’m not…”

Glimmer’s eyebrows knit together.

“I kind of get rejected a lot,” Scorpia said with an uncomfortable shrug.

Glimmer softened all over, gesturing to a plush couch nearby, and they sat.

“Tell me about it,” she said, staring down at her folded hands in her lap. “My best friends left me. Even before this, I was the weak princess, the one that always had to recharge. I didn’t fit.” Glimmer looked up at Scorpia. “But that’s changed now. We’ve changed now! We’re stronger than anyone knows. And we can do this. For everyone. And you won’t be there alone. I’ll help you,” Glimmer placed her hand on Scorpia’s claw, holding it, “We’ll be in this together.”

Scorpia blinked, stunned, and then Glimmer found herself wrapped up in what was easily one of the greatest hugs in her life.

“Ah, sorry, that was probably too much,” Scorpia said, releasing her and pulling away, but Glimmer returned it fiercely, only then realizing just how much she really needed a hug, lately.

“Oh,” Scorpia said, claws circling her once again, “Okay, still going. Wow.”

They sat there together for a blissful moment, until Glimmer heard Swift Wind’s unmistakable whinny sounding through the open window.

“Alright, you’re in?” she asked, pulling back. Her heart rate was elevated. They were operating on a timer, here.

“I won’t have to hurt anyone?” Scorpia clarified. Glimmer shook her head. “Then I’ll help. What now?”

—

“You’re back!” Perfuma greeted joyously, and Bow and Adora moved ahead of Swift Wind to hug her. “Oh and Entrapta! Wonderful!”

“I covered for you!” Frosta announced proudly.

“Eyyy, geek princess, back in the house,” Mermista said, smiling at Entrapta, who smiled broadly back. “Plus a giant, ugly new robot. Great.”

Mermista and Entrapta high-fived. “Looks like you found something useful on Beast Island,” Mermista commented, and Entrapta laughed, rubbing her hands together.

“Oh I found out so _many_ things! Beast Island was a treasure trove of data, everything makes sense now. My theories about what the First Ones did to this planet were not only correct, but so much more than I could have ever anticipated!” Entrapta said gleefully, walking alongside the group on her hair. Perfuma was curiously examining Micah, but listening to Entrapta also.

“Though of course, Adora probably knows all about it, since she’s part of it!” Entrapta said with a grin her way, and Adora frowned.

“What? Part of it? What do you mean?”

“So, quick—” Frosta tried, only to be cut off by Joanne projecting a hologram of what Entrapta had downloaded from her Beast Island lab. 

“The Heart of Etheria project! The First Ones were mining the planets magic, using it to power their weapon! The Heart draws its power from the magic of the princesses. Well, the princesses with runestones. Princesses of political domains, like me, won’t be affected any more than everyone else on the planet. But all the runestones need to be engaged for it to work.”

“Quick question,” Frosta tried again, but Entrapta was climbing all over Bright Moon’s hall, surrounded by her diagrams, lost in her explanation. 

“She-ra is the most important piece! The Key. She channels the weapon’s power and focuses it.”

“What,” Adora breathed, horrified, and Bow turned to her, reaching out and gripping her hand. 

“She-ra is the only entity strong enough to withstand the destructive energy of the Heart, so the First Ones embedded her runestone into the sword so they could control her. Use her. When the Heart is deployed, She-ra will raise the sword and FIRE IT!” Entratpa laughed. Then she stared at all of them again. “Which is a bad thing.”

“But if She-ra is the key, that means I can stop it, right?” Adora asked, frightened, staring at the stone on her wrist, “If She-ra fires the weapon, then I just won’t do that.”

“No, no, once the Heart is activated, nothing can stop it. No one will have a choice, least of all you. Not even the First Ones could control it, that’s why they left! When the weapon is activated it will channel all its power into you. But! The planet isn’t balanced right now.”

“It isn’t?” Perfuma asked.

“Nope! Scorpia doesn’t have any connection to the Black Garnet, which means the Heart can’t be activated.”

“If Scorpia is the missing piece, then shouldn’t she be here!?” Frosta shouted, stomping her foot. She’d been trying to bring up her new friend’s absence this whole time.

Everyone stopped, glancing around. Scorpia was nowhere in sight. And neither, Bow realized with horror, was someone else.

“And Glimmer,” Micah said dismounting from his perch on Swift Wind, “She should know this too.”

The heavy double doors flung open with unprecedented speed as Bow threw himself through them, skidding on his heel and taking down the hallway in a dead sprint. 

The princesses looked at each other, startled, and then ran after him.

“Glimmer!” he shouted, “Glimmer!”

—

“So I just,” Scorpia said uncertainly, staring at the circle of magic in front of her, the gloved hand reaching through it, “I just take your hand?”

“Yes, but don’t worry, I’ll be doing all of the magic,” Glimmer said, the tinkling of the spell drowning out the noises from the open window, and noises from the hallway, if there were any. “Just trust me, alright?”

Scorpia looked up at her, and smiled, nodding firmly. “For the good of everyone,” she murmured, reaching out.

—

No one else could keep up with Bow as he leapt the steps three, four at a time, as he shot down the hallway like an arrow from his bow. His whole body careened into the door of the room that he knew, he just _knew,_ she would be in. _“Glimmer!”_

His eyes went wide, and all his weight sank against the frame.

“Bow?” Adora asked, catching up with him finally.

“I saw them,” he said, “I saw them, right as they finished warping.”

Adora placed her hands on his arm and shoulder, shock the only thing keeping the panic at bay, for now. 

“Wait, what happened?” Mermista asked, also catching up, the rest of the group behind her.

“Glimmer, she, she must have talked to Light Hope! She knows the Heart is a weapon but she can’t know what it will do; Light Hope would never have told her!” Adora gasped, hands shaking.

“Scorpia was with her,” Bow said, rising off the doorframe and turning to them all, “They’re going to go activate the Heart.”

Entrapta, surprisingly enough, was the one who let loose a deep, frustrated growl. “AUGH! I should have explained this on the ship!” she shouted, turning and heading back down the hall, down the stairs. “But I was so excited, and everything was so interesting, and I got all caught up in the tech and I forgot to prioritize! Again!”

Emily beeped at her, Joanne getting to her heavy, lumbering feet.

“And now Scorpia is in danger because of it!” She huffed, climbing into Joanne’s mouth. “Come on Emily!” Entrapta said, wrapping her in her hair and hoisting her into Joanne with her, “Let’s go get our girl!”

Joanne closed with a mechanical whir and took off with a gait that shook the castle. 

“Swift Wind,” Adora shouted, hot on Entrapta’s heels, “take Bow and go to the Fright Zone! He’s the only one who can talk Glimmer down!” Micah was sitting, with his injured leg, in his old chair, and grew visibly panicked at Adora’s words.

“Adora?” Bow asked, even as he went to Swift Wind and mounted.

“I need to go to the temple. Light Hope is in charge of initiating the Heart, if I can stop it...”

“What are you going to do?” Frosta asked.

“I don’t know, but I need to do something!” Adora yelled, and transformed into She-ra. Bow’s head turned from the window Adora leapt out of to the group of others, and Perfuma was right there at his side. She placed her hand on the back of his own.

“Go,” she said, with as reassuring of a smile as she could muster, barely covering her own adrenaline-filled stress, “We’ll catch up.”

Bow smiled back, and bent down, catching Perfuma in a tight, but brief hug.

“Swift Wind!” Bow called.

“Let’s go!” Swift Wind answered.

“Your Majesty!” a guard called as she rushed into the hall from a side door. She examined those still present, and asked, “Where is the queen?”

“That’s our problem!” Perfuma answered, feeling the opposite of zen right then, “What’s your problem?”

_“All_ of our scouts have returned,” the guard said, much to everyone’s alarm. “The Horde is approaching us from every side!”

“UUUUUUUUUUGH!” Mermista shouted, lifting her hands to her sides, palms-up. “This is so much. You!” Mermista pointed at the guard, “Get on the line with Spinnerella and Netossa. We need them here, now! You, weird hobo dude,” she pointed at Micah, “What do you do?”

“I’m. I’m a sorcerer?”

“I don’t know what to do with that! Stay here and guard the castle with whatever sorcery you… sorce. Perfuma, Frosta!” She pointed at them. “Go find the Bright Moon General! Focus on guarding Bright Moon in the woods. We’ll need to let them get close, so we don’t spread our forces too thin, but we don’t let them _get_ to Bright Moon, got it?”

“Got it!” Frosta and Perfuma answered with a nod. 

“I’ll grab Sea Hawk and defend this place from the waterfront.” She grabbed her trident and took off at a run. “Come on people let’s move! It’s the end of the world!”

**Author's Note:**

> And then everything went down the same way it did in canon! Glimmer and Scorpia ran into the Horde gang, Scorpia united with the Garnet, Light Hope broke my heart and made me cry, and the princesses supercharged before suffering. *double fingerguns at you as sunglasses descend on my face*
> 
> Please tell me what you think! 
> 
> Comments/concrit are always, always welcome!


End file.
